


Teambuilding - Rammstein style

by Rehe_im_Walde



Category: Rammstein
Genre: Boys Will Be Boys, Eventual Fluff, M/M, Male Friendship, bandmates together
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-27
Updated: 2021-02-27
Packaged: 2021-03-18 13:21:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,535
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29734497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rehe_im_Walde/pseuds/Rehe_im_Walde
Summary: It has been getting more and more difficult to get the Rammstein bandmates together to work on something..anything...In a last desperate attempt, their band management decides to subject the guys to a tactic from business-life: 'Teambuilding'.The course will not go the way they had in mind..but will the result be?
Relationships: Richard Kruspe & Paul Landers
Kudos: 23





	Teambuilding - Rammstein style

**Author's Note:**

> This fic takes place at the end of summer 2020
> 
> (The characters are, ofcourse, their own and not mine. All thoughts and conversations are fictional.)

In the past it had often been hard to get all of Rammstein together again to work on new material but these days it was harder than ever. Everyone seemed to have their own projects lined up, and while that too wasn't new, in the past at least they had all made an effort to be in the same time and place for their mutual band, but even the will to do that seemed less and less.

Band management was starting to get worried, and although they knew better then to bring it up with the bandmembers (which would only result in the usual arguments of "we took more than 5 years for the last album, we're way ahead of that schedule.." or a round of 'blame the one who isn't there', whoever that turned out to be at that particular time), management wanted to do something.

But what?

Every trick in the unwritten book of 'managing a succesful rockband' had been used before, most with limited succes, because the bandmembers, who knew eachother for over 25 years (mostly longer), usually spotted management meddling from a mile away and would laugh it off as silly, newfangled ideas.

When finally a meeting to discuss the publishing of a new live DVD had been cancelled because again one of the musicians couldn't make it (this time it was Olli), management was at their wits end. So when the new trainee suggested something they had learned in one of their business-management-courses, they figured they'd give it a try as a last resort.  
"But we're not going to get involved ourselves, if they see us, they'd just dig their heels deeper in the sand.."  
"We could just have them do a 'tug of war', they can dig in all they like.."  
"Are you kidding? Till would have them flat on their faces in no time..no matter whether they were on the other team or his own.."  
"..that might actually help.."  
"We'll save that for plan B.."

\-----

And so it came to be that with a little trickery and a lot of plain lying the 6 Rammstein bandmembers were now together in a small bus, driving to what they thought was the venue for a one-time-only live performance; the one thing they had all missed after not being able to play live due to a global pandemic.

They had been somewhat surprised that they didn't have to bring their instruments to this gig, but were assured their technicians had arranged everything on location, so all were more or less patiently spending the time until they arrived on their respective phones or with a book.

When they arrived at a building near a lake in a wooded area about 50 kilometres outside of Berlin, the band got out of the bus and for a moment were confused by what they saw.   
"Is it an outdoor gig?"  
"Doesn't look much like a concert site.."  
"Are you sure this is.." Till turned to the bus-driver, who with one last look at the band started his vehicle and quickly drove off.

"What the..?"  
"Is this some kind of joke?"  
"Paul, did you.."  
"What? Why are you automatically thinking of me.." Paul frowned at Richard.  
"You're the resident prankster here, so to think this is your plan it's not that big of a leap...even for a shorty like you.."  
Paul's look became thunderous and he opened his mouth to snap back at the other guitarist, but a quick nod of understanding between Schneider and Olli was enough for them to each grab Paul under an arm and with a still struggling guitarist between them they made their way to the building.  
"Hey! No fair, why are you grabbing me, it was the diva who started it.."  
Now it was Richard's turn to frown "Stop calling me diva!" but as he started to go after the three men walking away, he too was grabbed, this time by Till, who locked his fist on the guitarist's bicep, tight enough to force Richard to walk along as he too started for the building.  
Flake chuckled after him "Do you need a hand with that.." as he hurried to walk next to Till.  
With a struggling Richard under his arm, trying to loosen the grip, Till grinned at the keyboarder "I'll take care of it this time, if he gets annoying again later, you can have a go.."

\-----

"Hello!! Welcome gentlemen! Come in, come in!"  
The door of the building swung open and a team of four 'twenty-somethings' (as Till whispered to Flake) beamed at them, clearly in a good mood to start whatever they had in mind.  
"Leave your coats! Did you bring your good moods? We're going to have fun today!"

Taken aback by this outburst of enthousiasm, the band akwardly allowed themselves to be ushered inside (Olli rolling his eyes at Schneider, the drummer smirking back at him, Paul leering at Richard, who was rubbing his painful bicep and leering back, Till mumbling to Flake to find a minibar somewhere) until they found themselves standing in a circle in what appeared to be the building's central room, a big empty space with chairs against the walls, and a few tables with boxes on them.

"Okay, welcome again! We're happy to have you here today for a course of actively working on ourselves and eachother, can we have a whoooaaa..."  
"Eh..no.." Till looked at the instructors, who abruptly stopped their yell with a confused look on their faces "..would you mind telling us what..ehm.." Till tried to find a friendly sounding phrase.  
"..the hell we're doing here?" Flake next to him finished the sentence for him.  
Till grinned "..yeah, what he said.."

"A course..with us.." one of the youngsters timidly offered.  
"A course of what.." Schneider interfered, crossing his arms, in his way looking as intimidating as Till.  
"Teambuilding..didn't they tell you...eh..sir?" the instructor took a step back at Schneider's piercing glance and looked back at his partners for help.  
"Teambuilding? We don't need teambuilding, we were already a team before you were born.." Till turned to Flake who nodded in agreement.  
"Newfangled stuff, back in the day in the east there was no need for teambuilding," Flake grumbled.  
"Right, let's find a beer.." Till nodded at Flake who instantly turned too "..I'm out.."

"There is no i in TEAM" one of the youngsters automatically responded with a new spur of enthousiasm, a splitsecond later wishing he hadn't, because now the eyes of all six bandmates focused on him in a near death stare.  
"I know where there's an i in TEAM" Paul snorted as his colleagues now turned to look at him instead.  
"Yeah, in the holes of the capital A.. old joke Paul, we already knew that one.." when Richard saw the others' faces he couldn't help but grin at Paul, as usual they were the first two to get a joke.  
"No, I meant there is an i in 'Team Emigrate' because that team is all you, isn't it.." Paul flashed a mischievous grin at Richard, making the other guitarist's smile fade.

Flake sighed and turned to the youngsters "See.. those two could do with your course, so good luck with that.." and again took a step away from the group.  
Schneider sneered after him "Oh, and you two are just off to the bar and leave us standing here? Seems to me you could do with a bit of a teambuild as well.."  
Till looked at him "You're not seriously thinking of doing this are you?"  
"Well why not, you've been going your own way a lot lately, doing all kinds of stuff except Rammstein, so maybe this isn't such a bad idea.."  
"Not likely.."  
"Proving my point.." Schneider and Till were now glaring at eachother.  
Olli sighed and looked around the room, Richard and Paul giving eachother the evil eye, Schneider and Till glaring, and Flake impatiently waiting for Till to join him.

The bassplayer turned to the instructing team, who stood uncomfortably in the middle of the group, not sure how to handle the situation "Will there be something to eat?"  
"Yes..that's actually part of the plan for today.." one of them timidly replied.  
"And alcohol..?"  
The youngsters chuckled, slowly getting back their initial enthusiasm "..they mentioned that that would help with your team, so there is beer available.."  
Olli looked at the others "We might as well give it a try, at least we'll get a free food and drink out of it.."  
"Whatever.." the promise of beers had mellowed Till down enough to go along with the idea..for now.  
Olli knew that if Till was game, the others would join in as well, at least for the time being, so he nodded to the instructors "Go on, we'll be good.."  
"But I still say only the guitarists need it.."

\-----

"Okay, so here's the plan: all of you are going to prepare various dishes and at the end of the day you'll have dinner together. You'll be divided in teams of two to prepare a dish each."  
Flake whispered at Till "That's easy, we'll dish up the crisps to go with the beer and then hang out at the lake until it's time to eat."  
Unperturbed the instructor went on "You will be divided into teams based on how often you argue with eachother, so you'll get to work on your teamspirit while you're cooking".

Paul and Richard looked at eachother and the others laughed "That's your first subteam right there.. give them the hardest challenge.."  
The guitarists were both too stubborn to admit defeat so they collected a big bag of potatoes and materials and went into the kitchen next door. Only a minute later the door was slammed shut and the others heard their raised voices (not clear enough to make out what was said) followed by a loud 'cloink' which sounded suspiciously like a potato hitting the doorframe and a loud "HEY!!".

The other four chuckled and decided to go outside with their own sets of food and gear, deciding to humor the instructors in going along with their designated subteams.

**=== Schneider & Till ============**

"Bloody bullshit this.."  
Schneider laughed "Yeah, like we need to teambuild anyway, we have loads in common.."  
Till snorted "Exactly..like..eh.." and for a moment he fell silent.   
Truth was that, although they had always been on the same page in the past, in recent years the drummer and himself had lived completely different lives outside of the band. "..we eh.. well, we haven't seen eachother much lately.."  
"Yeah well, I love being on dad-duty at home.." Schneider smiled "..what are we supposed to do with these bellpeppers they gave us.."

"Surely we still have something in common.." ignoring the drummer's remark, Till was juggling the knife they had taken with them, without any attempt to touch the vegetables "..oh hey, i know, we both make good use of your drumplatform on tour.." Till grinned mischievously.  
Schneider's smile faded and turned into a frown "Don't remind me, if I ever catch you getting a blowjob under my stage again when I'm on it, I'll chuck my drumsticks at you.."  
"Come on, it was only for a laugh.." Till snorted "..or were you jealous you weren't getting any.."  
"..or a cymbal.." Schneider dropped the bellpepper back in the bag and leant back, looking out over the lake.

Till glanced at him quickly, then leaned back as well, still juggling the knife.  
"Don't cut yourself with that."  
"I won't, and if I will, it'll be a fun story.."  
"Maybe your idea of fun.."

For a while they sat silently staring out over the lake, then Schneider chuckled.  
"What?"  
"I know what we have in common.."  
Till turned to look at him.  
"..we both had our dicks out on social media.."  
"What?!? When? I mean.." Till grinned "..mine has ofcourse, but that was for art.."  
Schneider snorted "Oh that's what you call it.."  
"But you? How? Where? When? Why didn't I know this?" Till forgot his knifejuggling, always interested in a good dick-story, but the last person he had expected it from was Schneider.

"Well, you know, family swimming trip, my wife made a photo with a lot of backlight so I was basically just a black outline, but I thought the photo was neat, so I posted it.."  
"Oh.." Till sounded a bit disappointed, starting to find where he had dropped the knife "..so you didn't really have it 'out' then.."  
"Yeah well, turns out the fans have some skills I hadn't expected, they brightened up the photo and well.."   
"..there 'little Schneider' was.." Till laughed out loud.  
"..'generously-sized Schneider' you mean.." Schneider laughed too.  
"Yeah yeah, you never where the small one in the band if I remember correctly.." Till chuckled "..so did you take the photo down?"  
"No it was out there.." (Till snorted at the unintended double entendre) "..and I figured I had nothing to be ashamed of.."  
"Good for you.."  
The singer and drummer looked at eachother and grinned.

"Okay, what about these bellpeppers.."  
"I wonder if the fans checked your photo with the Rammstein dildo-set, to see if they recognized yours.."  
Schneider grinned "We did say that we didn't pose for that one ourselves.."  
"Yeah.." Till chuckled "..because the guitarists chickened out, so we made that up so they didn't suspect anything, but you and I.."  
"Well, that opportunity was too good to miss, wasn't it.."  
"Yep, same here, hadn't expected it too be that hard though..posing.."  
"It wasn't just the posing that was hard.."

And as they reminisced about that particularly pleasant modelling session they had had, the bag of peppers lay abandoned behind them..

**=== Flake & Olli ===============**

"So what are we supposed to do with this minced meat then?"  
Flake pricked his finger in the mass of meat but redrew it quickly, flicking slivers of meat on the floor of the barn where Olli and he had settled down.  
Olli looked at him with a small smile "Well, if you're going to do that, we won't have a lot to eat tonight.."  
"With a bit of luck our guitarists make a whole bunch of food, at least they know how to cook."  
"Didn't sound like they were cooking.." In the distance another soft 'cloink' sounded as if on cue.

Flake grinned.   
He picked up a small nob of meat with two fingers and rolled it into a tiny ball.  
"If we're making meatballs, you might want to grab a handful.." Olli laughed "..Till will think it's a pea if it's that size.."  
Flake grinned too and again took two tiny blobs of meat; rolling one into a ball again and one into a small roll "We'll make that for Till.." as he put a ball to each side of the roll.  
Olli grinned as well "He'll appreciate it, anything for a good set of balls and a sausage.."  
"Hey, speaking of sausage, did you see Schneider's in that photo?" Flake leaned back, happy to be chatty. In the past he has been a bit in awe of his taciturn bandmate, but when he had realized Olli's usual lacks of words was a welcome distraction from the chatter of some of the others, and the bassplayer was an entertaining companion otherwise, the relationship between them had become easier.

"My wife showed it to me.." Olli smiled, in the meantime grabbing a few hands of minced meat to get a start on rolling them.  
"Pretty 'ballsy' move of him.." Flake chuckled at his pun, decided to get stuck in too, dropping the ready balls in the bowl they had taken with them.  
"You would know.."  
Flake's hand halted in the mount of meat, giving Olli a confused look.

Olli laughed out loud when he looked at Flake's face "You know, that old 'Mann gegen Mann' video.."  
"Yeah..? What about it?"  
"..your sausage was on display there too.."  
"Was it?"  
"Yep, happily swinging along to the tune.."  
"Oh.."  
Flake turned to look in the distance, hand still buried in the meat, considering this news "..good thing Till doesn't know, I'd never hear the end of it.."  
"Who do you think pointed it out to us..?"

Bassplayer and keyboarder now looked at eachother and at the same time started to laugh.  
"You know, when we were younger I thought you were scary.."  
"I thought you were weird.."  
"I am pretty weird.."  
"And I am pretty scary.."  
"I knew it.." Flake chuckled.

"Is meat cubes a thing...?

==============================

After a while the two subteams gathered their food and went back to the building.   
They were greeted the way they had left, with another 'cloink' from the other side of the kitchendoor from which Paul and Richard hadn't resurfaced yet.  
The instructors whispered to the other four "They seem to be working through some old issues, we decided not to bother them until they're done".  
And as the band already had enough experience with guitarists' discussions and none was eager to get dragged in the middle, they agreed to do the next dish amongst themselves as well, obediently going along with reshuffling he subteams (the instructors happily beaming at them, glad that at least that tiny part of the original plan was still upheld).

**=== Flake & Schneider ============**

"Sooo... do you cook?"  
"No, hate it.."  
"Maybe we should just call a takeaway.." Flake chuckled.  
"You dial, I'll order, teamwork: check!"  
"But then what should we do with these peaches.."  
Schneider looked at Flake and with his sweetest 'Frau Schneider' voice replied "You're such a good boy Flake, always wanting to please..the instructors.."  
Flake grinned "..for a minute I thought you were going to say 'Mummy'"  
"Not going to lie, for a minute I was.." Schneider grinned back "..those were some good times, me with the five of you on a leash..giving an extra tug if one of you misbehaved.."   
"Till liked it..not sure about Paul and Richard though.."

Schneider laughed "All the more reason for that extra tug with those two brats..how about you, I don't think you minded it too much?"  
"I've been used to being on a leash for so long in the live-show with Till, I don't mind a bit.."  
Flake opened a tin of peaches and tried to fish one out with a fork, but the peach slithered away with every attempt.  
Schneider leaned back, amused to follow Flake's pursuit of the peach, but without much effort to get involved.

"You know..I've started to read your books to my kids.."  
"Oh yeah..?" Flake looked up a bit surprised, he knew the others read his books, but had never discussed his writings with one of them.  
"Yeah, especially the ones of us on tour.. you know.. as bedtime stories.." Schneider chuckled.  
"Aren't they a bit young to know of what we get up to on tour?"  
"..I'm leaving out the sex and alcohol bits for now.."  
Flake snorted "..will be a short read then 'Look kids, Daddy goes on tour..the end'"

"How come we're having a conversation with 'Mummy' and 'Daddy' in it all of a sudden..?"  
"And leashes.."  
"With Olli I was just having an innocent talk about balls and sausages.."  
"So were Till and I.."  
Both drummer and keyboarder looked at eachother and grinned mischievously.

"So what about those peaches then.."  
"Oh, just give me that fork and we'll tuck into them, I could do with a snack.."

**=== Olli & Till ==================**

"I still say, this whole idea is bull.."  
"We get food, we get drinks, could have been worse.. at least we're not refereeing between our guitarists"  
"I'll drink to that, cheers!" and with a clink of their beerbottles, Till and Olli took a gulp and looked out over the lake.  
"It's really beautiful here.."  
"Yeah, I like being near a lake, thinking, fishing.."  
"So do I.."  
"Do you? I didn't know you did that.." Till lazily took another gulp "..you learn something new every day."

Olli smiled "Flake learned something new today as well.." chuckling at Till's interested look "..I told him about what you spotted in the 'Mann gegen Mann' video".  
Till laughed "Took him long enough..I wondered if he'd ever find out.."  
"He didn't seem to mind.."  
"He shouldn't.." Till grinned at the memory "..it was cute, him swingng along in the back.."  
"Not surprised you were the one spotting it.."  
"What can I say, I have my interests.."

Now it was Olli's turn to laugh "I'll get started on this salad stuff they gave us, want to join?"  
Till swigged the last drop of beer and slapped his hands "Nope, but I tell you what I am going to do, I saw some fishing gear in a shed over there. I'll try to catch us a fish here, so we at least have some real food tonight with all these veggies.."  
"Just like old times, one of the first times I met you, you were fishing in Schwerin."  
"Was I?"  
"Yeah.." Olli grinned "..but I didn't dare to ask if I could join..I thought you were way too cool to talk to me.."  
"You were always this quiet mysterious kid..I never knew what you were thinking, I never would have guessed you would have liked to come fishing.." Till flashed a smile at the bassplayer ".. just chuck that salad, I'll get you a fishing rod as well.."

Both were happy to just sit, look out over the water, with an occasional glance at their rods. No words were needed between them, and both preferred it that way, so with the exception of an occasional "..almost.." when a fish baited but managed to get away, their alotted time flew by faster then they liked.  
Just when a bell rang to announce a new round of subteaming, with a heartfelt "Yes!" Till swung a fish out of the water.  
"Tell whoever comes to team up with me next to bring a decent sized knife with him, I'm not going to debone this one with that salad-knife."

==============================

While Flake, Schneider and Olli were collecting their stuff for their last tasks (despite themselves actually starting to enjoy the afternoon), the kitchendoor opened and Paul appeared with a sheepish grin "Are there any more potatoes? We are out.."  
The others snorted, while one of the instructors handed him another sack.  
"Do you want to switch teams?"  
"Nope" Paul sounded very decisive while he weighed a potato in his hand. "..need to do more teambuilding with Richard.."   
"Paul Heiko Landers! Quit your yapping and get your butt back in here!"  
Paul instantly turned with a frown on his face, yelling "You get no say in where my butt is.." after a pause adding ".. and what are you middle-naming me for, Sven Richard Kruspe?"  
A disgruntled voice from the kitchen "That's not my name and you know it!"  
"You've used this one for so long, I thought you might be thinking of changing it again..you don't want to get bored of it" and with a load bang the kitchendoor was slammed shut again.  
The instructors looked at the others "We should really make them mingle too, this isn't how this is supposed to work.. don't you want to mix and work with them as well?"

Schneider and Olli exchanged a quick look, not even having to roll their eyes to know what the other one was thinking "No thanks, when they've stooped to this level, we rather not get involved, just lock that kitchen and throw away the key".  
The three bandmates grinned, grabbed their stuff and left again, before the instructors could object.

One of the youngsters threw away the written outline they had prepared in a trashcan nearby "We'll start the campfire, put some beer next to it and leave them to it."  
"We're not getting anywhere with this group, doubt this is what their management had in mind.."  
"Hey, we did the best we could, and look at the bright side, nothing has been burned down, no one was killed.."

'Cloink'

"..yet.."  


**=== Flake & Till ===============**

"Heeeeyyy, did Olli tell you..."  
Flake grinned, happy to find Till enjoying himself, he handed Till the knife and while he sat down he opened a package of salami sausages "I thought we'd pick an easy task.."  
"Good thinking.." Till made room and cut down the sausages "..tuck in!"  
Flake made himself comfortable on the water's edge next to the singer.

Till nudged Flake with his elbow "You are my favorite teammate.."  
"Yeah, I know.."  
"Would have said so, even if you hadn't brought salami.."  
Flake giggled "But I bet that helped.." then nudged Till back ".. same here.."

For a while Till busied himself with gutting the fish, Flake watching him with interest, but without feeling the need to say much. The two had been getting along from the first moment they had met years ago, and that had never changed over the years. Even if they hadn't seen eachother for months, the minute they werd back together it always felt like they hadn't been apart.

When the fish was gutted, Till cleaned the knife on the water's edge and cut up another piece of salami, offering Flake one on the tip of the knife. He settled down next to the keyboarder, a little closer then he would normally do with another person, and with a content sigh, looked at him "I missed hanging out with you.."  
"Would have thought you wouldn't have had time for that, you've been so busy travelling."  
"Yeah, but when it comes down to just hanging out, having a beer and chatting, there's no one I can do that with, like with you."  
"On that note..tadaaa.." Flake grinned and pulled the two bottles of beer he had taken with him out if the bag.  
"See, great minds think alike.." Till's laugh rang out over the water "..cheers!"

"Sooo, Olli told me something interesting today.."  
"Yeah, he said.. you really didn't know?" Till grinned "..I'm amazed Paul hasn't teased you to death with it.."  
Flake scratched his head "Now you mention it..he did ask me once if I remembered the sausages at the 'Mann gegen Mann' shoot, but I thought he meant the catering.. in hindsight, he probably meant this.."  
"They did have great 'Frankfurter' sausages at the catering of that shoot though.." Till put another piece of salami in his mouth and offered Flake one "..and great mustard.."  
"That's exactly what I said to Paul and then the whole thing turned into a discussion about which kind mustard goes best with which kind of sausage.." Flake flicked the salami in his mouth "..and I guess he forgot he planned to tease me.."  
"Sounds like Paul alright.." Till chuckled and gave Flake's knee a squeeze.   
Flake put his hand around Till's shoulder and sighed happily while looking out over the water "..I miss hanging out with you too.."

"I could sit here all day and be happy enough.."  
"You pretty much did.." Flake gave Till's shoulder a squeeze.  
"Just that I could do with some more food.."  
"Let's head back then, we've finished pretty much what I brought anyway.."

**=== Olli & Schneider =============**

"Damn.." Schneider opened the bag he had randomly grabbed "..it's those bellpeppers again...I didn't know what to do with those when I teamed up with Till.." and with a mock-piteous face he looked at his partner.  
"Well..we could fry them, stuff them, put them on a pizza, make a soup .."  
"Ugh..." Schneider sighed and unenthusiastically squeezed one "..that all sounds really cheffy.."  
Olli chuckled "..or we could just eat them raw..."  
Schneider's mood instantly improved "Yeeeey! Done!"

They both grinned.  
Schneider handed Olli a beer "Here's to us, the rhythm section of Rammstein!"  
"The steady backbone.."  
"The ones who keep everyone on track.."  
"That we may long keep the beat going.."  
"..while the others frolic around on stage.."  
"Cheers!" 

They both grinned and settled down against the barn in the slowly fading sunlight.  
"Soo...what have you been up to lately.." Olli grinned "..you know, apart from going swimming in all your natural splendor.."  
Schneider looked at the bassplayer next to him "Oh god, I'll never hear the end of that, don't tell me you tried your hand on lightening that picture as well.."   
"Please..if I wanted to see you in your birthday suit, I'd just barge into your dressing room on tour, you know 'Hey Schneider, can I come in..oops..'. Why would I bother with a picture if I can catch the live show.."  
Schneider chuckled "I thought it was just Paul who did that.."  
"..and who do you think puts Paul up to that.."

For a while they were happy to watch the sun set over the lake, occassionally hearing Till or Flake's laugh from the other side of it.  
"I do frolic sometimes too, you know..on stage..have a little fun with one of the guitarists."  
"Yeah, I usually watch what you guys are up to..I think the guys'd like you to do more of that.."  
Olli chuckled "..can't..I'm always afraid I'd loose the beat.."  
Schneider laughed "Richard does that..and then he has to run to get to his mic in time..sometimes I'm tempted to speed up the drumming a tiny bit, just to see if he'll make it back.."  
"Paul is the only one who can frolic without loosing the plot.."  
"Oh please..he just doesn't care if he misses it..he'll just pretend that that's the way it's supposed to be anyway and has a bit of fun with a cute person in the audience to cover up."

"In a way I regret that we're not playing together today, I really missed it.." Olli looked at Schneider.  
Schneider leaned back against the bassplayer's shoulder and playfully patted his leg, letting his hand linger on the other's thigh.  
"We really should play.. we all love doing that.."  
"Maybe we should arrange a date tonight, while we're all together anyway.."

"Here, have another piece of bellpepper...we might as well finish it..if they don't see it, they won't know it was supposed to be there anyway.."

==============================

Till and Flake and Olli and Schneider met at the foodpath going back to the main building.  
From afar they could already see a good campfire going with comfy lawn chairs around it, all four where laughing and joking, looking forward to a relaxed evening.

"This turned out pretty good after all."  
"Yeah...seems we didn't make that much food though.." Schneider looked between them, realizing that apart from the fish that playfully dangled from Till's arm, the result of the afternoon, mainly turned out to be a couple of empty bags.  
"Let's hope our quarrelling guitarists managed to cook us up something.."  
"Sounds tricky to put all our hopes on them.."  
"If not, we'll just tell them 'we are not angry with you, just a little disappointed at how useless guitarists are..' that usually helps with those two.."  
"That, or they start bickering about which one is more useless than the other.."  
"Hard to tell what mood they'll be in..they sounded pretty thunderous all day."  
"Oh, hey, there they are.."  
"..at least they're still alive.."

Olli pointed to the rendezvous, where the guitarists were busy carrying large bowls from the kitchen to a large table next to the fire.  
As Richard stacked potato croquettes on a plate, Paul brushed behind him with a bowl of potato mash. He put it down, for a second watched Richard making neat stacks with the croquettes, then grinned and gave the other guitarist a quick peck in the neck "Looks really good.."  
Richard grinned too, took a step back, slipped his hand around Paul's waist and kissed him on the cheek.  
For a moment both guitarists stood admiring their work, then Paul rubbed Richard's back before loosening the embrace. He took Richard's hand "Come on, let's get the stuffed wedges, can't wait to hear what the others will say.." and while giggling the two retreated to the kitchen.

'The others stopped walking, taking in the scene they had just witnessed..  
"Well..." Flake hesitated, not sure what to say.  
Till was quicker on the uptake and his smile disappeared "Those fuckers! They played us with their make-believe fight."  
"..maybe they patched things up.."   
Till snorted derisively "I bet they just spent the whole afternoon like the two smug brats they are, thinking they'd outsmarted us.."  
"At least they do seem to have made some food.."  
"And they get along, that's always a plus.."   
Olli and Flake were reluctant to let the relaxed mood of the afternoon crumble away.  
Schneider was remarkably quiet.  
Till was still fuming "Who cares, we could have gotten food at home without all this hassle, I'll just give them a piece of my mind!"

As Till started to stomp down the path, Schneider grabbed him by the arm "No, wait.." (not for the first time that afternoon Flake was involuntary reminded of 'Frau Schneider')  
"Not a chance.." Till pulled himself free and took another step down the path "..I'll kick their butts.."

"Maybe later.." Schneider grinned "..but I have a better idea.."

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is a bit of a trial, and I wasn't sure if I should post or throw away, but I needed to get it out of my head, so..


End file.
